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A concept of time
Geoff_One wrote:
<<Here, the "HAD" MAY have been added for emphasis - Someone MAY be trying to explain that work was done even though it ended up being nugatory due to unforeseen circumstances. PERHAPS by using HAD, the reader can more easily remember that work was done.>>
My reply: Look at your MAY and PERHAPS. I really cannot argue with something like this.
In my humble opinion, if tenses can be explained just by two simple notions of time (past and present), why shall we create endless Meanings and Adjectives and Perhaps, to confuse young students? Don't we agree that tense is used to tell time anymore?
As we may see, in a recount of story -- a past background, the author will go into details. Actually, the author here states only a single case of flying:
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Tim Johnson and I were planning on chasing on Friday May 15th, 1998. Our plan was to meet in Hudson, WI and go from there. AFTER TIM HAD LEFT for Hudson from Wisconsin Rapids, I realized that the situation was not something that we wanted to chase. Storms were HP related and they were moving north at 50 to 70 mph. I never saw storms move so fast in my life. These were certainly not something we wanted to be chasing. Not only would they be impossible to keep up with, but they would also be so rain-wrapped that you were asking for trouble.
We met in Hudson at about 3:30pm and decided to head west into the twin cities to sit the storm out at my place. Before we left Hudson we stopped at the rest area in Hudson and looked at the DTN radar they had there. We noticed some severe cells moving north. They had a bow echo look to them. So we decided to try to get to the edge of the storms and watch them go by.
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On the other hand, in a commentary -- the present background, even we have a recount of something, we don't usually went down into details. We just recap the whole thing in a gross way:
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AFTER TIM LEFT high school, he was in and out of a number of bands in the NYC area. In 1965, he went on a lounge tour of the Eastern Seaboard with Rick Martin and the Showmen, where he met Mark Stein, the keyboardist and vocalist. The two of them hit it off, and they soon left to join with drummer Joey Brennan and guitarist Vince Martell to form their own band, The Pigeons. After recording an album called "While the World was Eating", they replaced drummer Joe Brennan with Carmine Appice and changed the name of the band to Vanilla Fudge.
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However, this is my own observation and cannot prove anything at all. Whether it is past background or present background, would need a few more sentences, even paragraphs, to testify.
engtense,
<< Geoff_One wrote:
Here, the "HAD" MAY have been added for emphasis - Someone MAY be trying to explain that work was done even though it ended up being nugatory due to unforeseen circumstances. PERHAPS by using HAD, the reader can more easily remember that work was done.>>
Actually Ant_222, pointed this out before I did in different words.
As for the MAY and the PERHAPS:
In the circumstances I described, I would add the HAD for emphasis.
Ditto, I would more easily remember that work was done.
My reply: May I know emphasis of WHAT, so that you can more easily remember?
I don't believe the theory that some tense is used to help our memory. This theory is only "perhaps".
Concerning your <after + past simple> examples.
«On March 18, 2003, a 20-year old male volunteer fire fighter (the victim) died AFTER HE WALKED into the path of a tractor-trailer truck.»
Answer please: If this sentence, originally used in a present background context, were part of a story, would you use Past Perfect in it? I am afraid that if you say "Yes", you will be wrong, because this sentence should be the same as part of a story and of a comment.
«Here is some of what Mordechai Vanunu said today right AFTER HE WALKED out of prison.»
What if you meet a similar phrase in a tale?
«After he walked out of prison, he went to the old money-lender, killed him in his house and, after a short search, found where the old man had kept pledged things.»
Will you say it is wrong? IMHO, if you will, you will be wrong yourself. I am sure it is a correct sentence, at least, as regards the use of tenses.
«In the years AFTER HE WALKED on the Moon, some of literature's biggest names - Stephen Ambrose and James Michener among them - pursued Armstrong's biography with no success.»
These sentences were used in present background in your original example. But what if they were part of past background? I think, they would be still correct.
As to the rest of your Past Simple examples, I can't imagine them as parts of a non-Present Background context, so they are not good arguments. Of course, if you formally rewrite them as parts of a Past background, Past Simple will be changed to Past Perfect. But that will happen only due to the sequence of tenses, since that examples contain reported speech. Therefore, this will not help you to prove that tenses depend on time backgrounds.
« AFTER HE HAD WALKED about the world for a long time, he entered into a dark forest...»
But I am sure it would be grammatically incorrect to write: «After he walked about the world for a long time...»
The same applies to examples #5 and #6:
«So AFTER HE HAD WALKED the whole day...»
«AFTER HE HAD WALKED for a long time...»
Past Simple can not be used in them in neither Present nor Past backgrounds. If you write: «After he walked the whole day,...» you will be wrong anyway, regardless of the time background.
As to «AFTER HE HAD WALKED some 200 miles,...», I incline that Past Simple is impossible here too, though I am not sure...
«My reply: Just because the example contains Simple Present IS, it is a comment, a present background. Therefore, Past Perfect is not suitable.»
What if I turn my example into a part of a tale? In this way:
«After Tim had left, I found the lost key. So, I couldn't give it back to him.»
And I rather doubt my initial example is incorrect, as you insist. I am sure it is ok, as well as the last one. If you don't think so, I (or you) can ask about it in a separate thread here on Antimoon. If it turns to be correct, your theory will fail. Don't leave this unanswered. Say whether you want it to be verified, as well as all other my statements about the correctness of various sentences and phrases.
«Being important or evident is not the criterion to tell the difference between <after + Simple Past> and <after + Past Perfect>. No Adjectives or Meanings can explain tenses; only Time does.»
Your so-called time backgrounds have nothing common with Time. Regardless of which time background it is, the action in question took place at a certain time. But, for some reason, you change the tense expressing that action as the time background changes. But the time of the action is the same. Therefore, not only Time affects the choice of tenses, even from your viewpoint.
«As we may see, in a recount of story -- a past background, the author will go into details.
...
On the other hand, in a commentary -- the present background, even we have a recount of something, we don't usually went down into details. We just recap the whole thing in a gross way:
...
However, this is my own observation and cannot prove anything at all. Whether it is past background or present background, would need a few more sentences, even paragraphs, to testify.»
Thus the time background is determined by:
1. Is it a recount story or not (quite ambigous)
2. Does the author "go into details" or "just recap the whole thing in a gross way". (ambigous, fuzzy)
3. "Whether it is past background or present background, would need a few more sentences, even paragraphs, to testify" (Do you mean, that in most cases you don't understand what you are reading about, untill you read severeal paragraphs about it?)
... And maybe something else that you might have missed...
Hmmm. After having written and, then, read this list, I can't think of your 'theory' in any way other than as of a very complicatred and difficult to apply, not to mention its correctness.
Of course, my (and, as it seems to me, the common) approach uses fuzzy criteria too. But:
1. Only one simple criteria.
2. It's fuzziness is compensated by the fact that this criteria is intuitively clear and easy to understand for (it seems to me) most of people.
Ant_222 wrote:
<<Concerning your <after + past simple> examples.
«On March 18, 2003, a 20-year old male volunteer fire fighter (the victim) died AFTER HE WALKED into the path of a tractor-trailer truck.»
Answer please: If this sentence, originally used in a present background context, were part of a story, would you use Past Perfect in it? I am afraid that if you say "Yes", you will be wrong, because this sentence should be the same as part of a story and of a comment.>>
My reply: I explained <after + past simple> by the background, and you still cut them out one by one. I will not discuss all of them this way. However, I will focus on the first one, the one you mentioned above.
I bring back the whole paragraph and here it is:
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On March 18, 2003, a 20-year old male volunteer fire fighter (the victim) died AFTER HE WALKED into the path of a tractor-trailer truck. On March 18, 2003, the U.S. Fire Administration (USFA) notified the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) of the death. On April 15, 2003, two Occupational Safety and Health Specialists from the NIOSH Fire Fighter Fatality Investigation and Prevention Program, Division of Safety Research, investigated the incident. The NIOSH team met with the Chief of the department and those directly involved with the incident— fire fighters, emergency medical technicians, the highway patrol, the dispatcher, and the Justice of the Peace. The team visited the incident scene and reviewed the department’s standard operating procedures (SOPs), witness statements, the State fire marshal’s report, traffic report, and autopsy report.
== http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/face200313.html
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Now the <after + Simple Past> "after he walked" IS INDEED A PART OF A STORY. Would the writer uses Past Perfect? No! As I explained in this page above, the author will recap the whole story grossly, but because the whole page is a present background (please click and look in), Past Perfect is not used. This is my answer.
What do you say now, please?
I may restate how I explained after-clause.
I searched exact match for "after he walked", and it appears in the web pages that are present background. Is this coincident?
I then searched about "after he had walked", and it appears in the web pages that are past background. Is this again coincident?
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And then, I searched for "after Tim left", and it appears in the web pages that are present background. Is this coincident, again?
And then, I searched for "after Tim had left", and it appears in the web pages that are past background. Is this really a coincident?
I didn't create examples. They are there in searching engines.
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Despite my examples, you cut out after-clause on one-sentence basis, and challenged me if I can see past background or present background. So, if my theory of background is wrong, your theory of emphasis may be correct. However, you can never give any example to prove that, if not using Past Perfect, Simple Past will be not evident.
I here announce it openly, as I have challenged you before. If you can produce an example of after-clause, the sequence of which will be not evident if using Simple Past, so that we have to use Past Perfect, I will believe in your explanation and discard my theory of background.
For goodness's sake, you don't even find one example to back you up!!
I am interested in how you can make readers, like Geoff_One, believe in your theory of emphasis, so I reviewed what you have said:
Ant_222 wrote:
<<In subordinate clauses Past Perfect is used in order to emphasize that the action desribed in the subordinate clause happened before that of the main clause. The Past Simple variant doen't especially draw the reader's attention to the sequence of actions:
«As soon as (or After) I finished my work, I went home» — here the sequence of actions is evident and it is neither emphasized nor doubted.>>
Wisely, you just implied there are examples in which the sequence of actions is NOT evident. And Geoff_One believed in it.
Now it is time for you two to make up examples to support your explanation, isn't it? Well, at least one example, do you agree?
«My reply: I explained <after + past simple> by the background, and you still cut them out one by one.»
But I don't just cut sentences out of the context. I propose that you should imagine these cut sentences in another background. I ask you: «What if you meet this sentence in another time background?». Thus, I don't make it impossible to apply your 'theory'. I just ask you to apply it to the same sentence in another background.
According to you, if the sentence I quoted was part of past background, it would use Past Perfect. And I expressed a doubt in the fact that it would really be so. I think, this sentence will be <after + Past Simple> regardless of what background it is in. If my doubt proves true, I can conclude you are not right.
After having read this, I hope, you'll return to my previous post and answer the questions I have written in it.
«... but because the whole page is a present background (please click and look in), Past Perfect is not used. This is my answer.
What do you say now, please?»
It's OK. I understand your point.
Do you agree that a story in the name of third person is in past background? If it is so, then do you think the author can't use <after + Past Simple> constructions? If you say "Yes", you'll be wrong.
«And then, I searched for "after Tim left", and it appears in the web pages that are present background. Is this coincident, again?
And then, I searched for "after Tim had left", and it appears in the web pages that are past background. Is this really a coincident?»
Is it a coincident that your <after + Past Simple> examples will be always <after + Past Simple> independently of the time background? The same about the <after + Past Perfect> examples?
According to your 'theory', a sentence of the kind <after + Past Simple + [main clause]> is always used in a present background. If we take one of such sentences and place it in a past background, we'll have to change it to <after + Past Perfect + [main clause]>, as you insist.
Let's assume you are right. Can you create two examples (two paragraphs - in order for the background to be seen), containing the same sentence in themselves, so that in one paragraph this sentence is in the form <after + past simple> and in the other in the form <after + Past Perfect>. The examples must be in all ways the same safe time backgrounds. After (and if) you create them, we'll ask at the forum wether they are correct.
«I didn't create examples. They are there in searching engines.»
I believe you. But your explanation of the examples makes me think that you can explain any given <after + Past Simple/Perfect> sentence with your 'theory', but you can't decide what to write when you encounter this dilemma.
Let's consider one of your explanations:
«As I explained in this page above, the author will recap the whole story grossly, but because the whole page is a present background (please click and look in), Past Perfect is not used. This is my answer.»
It seems to me that you might explain it in the following way. First, you notice that Past Simple was used. Then you find out that this is a recount story. "Well, you think, since Past Simple is used here, I'll have to find an indication to a present background.", and you look above and below the text. Then, you write: "Of course, it is a present background, because the whole page is a present background."
But this given story may have nothing to deal with the rest of the page!
Generalizing in such a way you can say about everything, that it is a present background. But when you find Past Perfect, you don't generalize to such a great extent and, of course, conclude it is a past background.
This is where the fuzziness of past/present backgrounds becomes apparent.
«Despite my examples, you cut out after-clause on one-sentence basis, and challenged me if I can see past background or present background. »
See my first reply in this post.
«So, if my theory of background is wrong, your theory of emphasis may be correct. However, you can never give any example to prove that, if not using Past Perfect, Simple Past will be not evident»
It is not evident, for example, because we discuss the use of these tenses here, and because we don't agree about the correctness of some sentences.
«I here announce it openly, as I have challenged you before. If you can produce an example of after-clause, the sequence of which will be not evident if using Simple Past, so that we have to use Past Perfect, I will believe in your explanation and discard my theory of background.»
I didn't say that such an example exists. You got me wrong. By evidence I meant the evidence of the sequence of actions for the interlocutors. For example, they may discuss what appeared before: the egg or the hen. In this case the would emphasize not the matter of the actions but their sequence and use Past Perfect instead of Past Simple.
«I am interested in how you can make readers, like Geoff_One, believe in your theory of emphasis, so I reviewed what you have said:...»
It seems to me that Geoff_One thought like me long time before this discussion... As to my words you quoted below, I answered it above.
«Now it is time for you two to make up examples to support your explanation, isn't it? Well, at least one example, do you agree?»
I am tired of repeatedly writing the same examples. Refer to my examples about the lost key and about the letter.
And at last, I'd like to ask you to apply your theory to the following example:
This is part of a tale, a narrative text.
«... He sat in a brown study for a long time after he [had — ?] finished reading the letter. It was filled with so many new and wonderful things that his brain was in a whirl as he attempted to digest them all...»
Now tell me, which tense would you use here: Past Perfect or Past Simple?
Ant_222 wrote:
<<Do you agree that a story in the name of third person is in past background? If it is so.....>>
My reply: Is this the way you recognize a past background, by the third person? Please forget the background theory. I was unable to explain anything about it to you.
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I asked:
«Now it is time for you two to make up examples to support your explanation, isn't it? Well, at least one example, do you agree?»
You wrote:
<<I am tired of repeatedly writing the same examples. Refer to my examples about the lost key and about the letter.>>
My reply: After I have spent so much time to examine and collect so many long examples for you, you are tired even to repeat the near-by example, you own example. I can see you are very tired. It's okay, I will repeat it for you:
Ant_222 wrote:
<<«After Tim had left, I found the lost key. That is why I couldn't give it back to him.» — here the sequence of actions is important. If Tim hadn't left before the key was found, he would have received it back. >>
My reply: So, it is your best example, the sequence of which is NOT evident if expressed in Simple Past:
Ex: After Tim left, I found the lost key.
I am impressed.
You and I have a remarkable difference in understanding. I am afraid we have expressed ourselves enough. Take a good rest.
Look at the following examples to see where it is useful and not useful to use HAD.
In the afternoon, the weather bureau had issued a warning predicting heavy rain, very strong winds and golf ball size hail. While the heavy rain eventuated, the hail didn't and the winds were only strong.
The weather bureau issued a warning predicting heavy rain, very strong winds and golf ball size hail. So take action to protect yourselves.
«My reply: Is this the way you recognize a past background, by the third person? Please forget the background theory. I was unable to explain anything about it to you.»
I just meant that a fragment of a story can be considered as being in a past background, because the whole story makes all it's fragments be in a past background.
«My reply: So, it is your best example, the sequence of which is NOT evident if expressed in Simple Past:...»
It seems to me that you didn't read my previous post entirely... That have been explained in it. And why do you ingnore my questions?
Ant_222 wrote:
<<It seems to me that you didn't read my previous post entirely... That have been explained in it. And why do you ingnore my questions?>>
My reply: It seems to me that I have answered your questions. Please read my previous post entirely.
Geoff_One,
If you search exact match for "after he had walked", you will find many web pages that contain many Past Perfect actions:
== http://www.google.com/search?q=%22after+he+had+left
You may please choose examples from these pages, so we may have a good reference. If all these pages do not support or contain your question, your question may be rare or not existent. I cannot handle such questions.
Sorry for the inconvenience.
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